Google Reveals Its Robot Cars Are Among Us

reply to post by badw0lf


Well google drives these around to get shots for google street view. That is the point of these.

With that said I don't know about mouse / keyboard for driving a drone car. I mean if it was a shooter bot I could see it but I would probably use the good ol' xbox controller for driving.

Originally posted by GobbledokTChipeater

Originally posted by harrytuttle
I'm actually surprised that the Department of Transportation hasn't sent them a cease & desist letter. This is completely illegal - public streets are not where Corporations are supposed to be conducting research and development of unapproved and unproven autonomous driving systems.

While you do make a good point, could it not be considered similar to cruise control? After all, there is a human driver in the seat with over-riding access to all of the cars controls.

The point is, that "cruise control" is a technology that has been tested, evaluated, and certified by the standards organizations and the Department of Transportation. Just who tested, evaluated, and certified these "over ride" switches in the Google test vehicles? A corporation, an intern, somebody who was under budgetary pressure by some mid level manager to get the tests going no matter what the cost?

If we allow this 1 corporation to just by-pass government/industry oversight and "go live" in the public, why don't we just open the doors for all corporations to do their R&D in the public?

This is a matter of principle, and just because Google hasn't killed anybody yet, doesn't make what they did morally or legally correct.

There have been quite a few developments in the technology in the last few years. Here's a Top Gear clip where they take a BMW round their test track at full racing speed with no human input.



Here's a video of a self parking Lexus.

reply to post by harrytuttleI think you've got a point too, but TBH I really cant imagine that Googles corporate lawyers would have allowed this to go ahead (or not resigned if their advice was refused) if the tech hadn't been thoroughly track tested before being let loose on the street. I also cant imagine that any Police Dept would agree to allow it unless there was well documented evidence that such testing had been successful.
Can you imagine the law suits if someone got injured by 1 of these cars? Imagine if somebody was killed... Nevermind that someone would go to jail & it would cost millions to settle, from the POV of Googles board, the damage to their brand name would be insufferable.
Dogpile is a better search engine & Microsoft are always ready to use any trick in the book to take up any slack in a market...

When the car arrives, will it play the Windows 3.1 'TaDa' sound?!

"Hi honey, " TaDa, "I'm home!"

so a couple questions here:

1) Do you still need a driving license
to ride in it if you don't drive?
If not that would be excellent
news for teenagers who want
to ride around looking cool.

2) If you're not driving and your
car is driving you home from
a bar after sluffing down 22
shots of Jim Beam. Will you get
the DWI ticket if pulled over?

reply to post by boondock-saint


lol i love the way you think.

Uh i think i can partially answer the 2nd question. If the car has an override system, and errors are possible, the driver needs to be alert enough to take over if need-be... so yea... u can still get ticketed for DUI unless they create a fool proof system.

Originally posted by ugie1028
Uh i think i can partially answer the 2nd question. If the car has an override system, and errors are possible, the driver needs to be alert enough to take over if need-be... so yea... u can still get ticketed for DUI unless they create a fool proof system.

so how is the cop gonna know who's actually driving?
Is there gonna be a light on top to signal a computer
driver? kinda like a taxi cab with an "occupied"
light on. lmao
sorry just had to ask

reply to post by boondock-saint


If its just one person in the car, that person has to be able to take over the vehicle. Just in case there is a failure with the car driving itself... the person in the car needs to be able to control the car... even if the car is pulled over and your drunk, but plead to the cop that u weren't driving. It wont matter, in case you had to take over, you would be DUI. if a sober backup driver was in the car, then no DUI for you.

even if the car is on autopilot... you'll still have to be able to control the vehicle in case there is a system failure.

I dont see a way around the DUI unless the system is fool proof.

Originally posted by harrytuttle

The point is, that "cruise control" is a technology that has been tested, evaluated, and certified by the standards organizations and the Department of Transportation. Just who tested, evaluated, and certified these "over ride" switches in the Google test vehicles?

I'm POSITIVE that these systems have been tested and evaluated 100's of times by the design engineers before they would let them loose on the road. The way you are saying it, anyone would think they are testing the first ever 'beta driver' on the road.

Of course they aren't certified. Does a certification even exist for this system?

While you say it is highly illegal, the police who okay'd this would probably tend to disagree.

Originally posted by mclarenmp4...Here's a Top Gear clip where they take a BMW round their test track at full racing speed with no human input...

That's the one I was talking about! Nice.

Google powered cars are among us.
How will road rage work, will we get mad at the passenger? Or Google? Will road rage turn into emails sent to Google?

To: [email protected], wt(heck) buddy, get out out of your server, come on , lets go.

I'm sure the google mail server would have plenty of cookie cutter replies all ready for them. Such as , google server replies, ( learn to install a driver moron). Or something.

Would google powered cars have different options?
Option A: Below speed limit grandma driver. (Low insurance rates)
Option B: .99% speed limit technical level. (money saver option)
Option C: Exact speed limit at all times. ( Good citizen option)
Option D: Little fun is OK setting ( Pay a little more for some fun)
Option E: Law enfocement setting (Public pays a little more for some fun)
Option F: (very expensive) kamikaze setting. (Usually granted to VIP's or people with money)

Self driving google vehicles sound really amazing. After they get a foothold on that whole lawsuit thing.

Please continue the discussion in the existing thread here.

Thank you.

Thread closed.